Contents

Ironic characterization

Role reversal

Sometimes, characters fulfill a role opposite from an earlier one. Other times, they reverse roles with a specific other character.

Becoming the enemy

Similar to role reversal, several characters transform into figures they once despised.

James sought revenge against the original Sawyer. He ended up taking on Sawyer's name and running the same con he had pulled. He even became responsible for orphaning a child. ("The Moth") ("The Candidate")

Ironic plot development

Death

Many characters on Lost have suffered ironic deaths. These deaths appear ironic in various ways, sometimes poetically just, sometimes obeying karmic retribution and often following dramatically ironic statements.

Inescapable fate

Though the Island gave some people a fresh start, characters often found themselves repeating parts of their lives they sought to escape.

Kate, who was 'born to run', crashed on the Island, where she had nowhere to run. ("Tabula Rasa")

Sayid, who regretted torture, had to exploit his skill on the island. He later found himself drawn into a full-time life of murder. ("Solitary") ("The Economist")

Claire boarded a plane in order to give up her baby, only to be stranded on an island where she has no choice but to raise it as her own. ("Raised by Another")

Locke escaped a life of sitting at a cubicle, only to end up a slave to 'the button' in the Swan. After escaping life in a wheelchair, he became a slave to another wheeled chair. ("Walkabout") ("Adrift")

At other times, characters ironically succeed at endeavors, though not as they originally planned.

Locke was denied admission on an "authentic aboriginal walkabout tour", only to land on the Island and engage in a similar experience. ("Walkabout")

Jin followed a woman in orange, noting a prophecy to find true love. She wasn't his true love, but in the process, he found Sun. ("...And Found")

Bernard took Rose to an Australian faith healer. The trip failed, but it led them to the Island, which healed Rose. ("S.O.S.")

Jack, like many Americans, traveled to Phuket to "find himself". He failed in this, but he ended up on a different beach on a different island, where he truly did discover his destiny. ("Stranger in a Strange Land")

Sawyer failed on a mission to find and kill the original Sawyer. He immediately crashed on the Island. The original Sawyer ended up there with him. ("The Brig")

Hurley played the lottery to improve his life, and he even won. His grandfather then died, lightning struck the priest at his funeral, his brother Diego's wife left him for a woman, his new home caught fire, his mother broke her ankle before seeing the new home and Hurley was wrongly arrested as a drug dealer. ("Numbers")

Kate snuck an audience with Miles to learn if she could safely leave the Island without fearing the law. She learned she couldn't, but her plan convinced Locke to exile her from the Barracks, ultimately leading to her leaving the Island. ("The Economist")

Kate went back to the Barracks to rescue her friends, but instead was captured herself. ("Follow the Leader")

Juliet had been brought to the Island to study or cure the pregnancy problems that occurred since the Incident. She ended up unwittingly contributing to the Incident. The other survivors did as well - and they had been trying to prevent it. ("The Incident, Parts 1 & 2")

The Man in Black hoped to use Desmond to put out the Light so he could be free from the Island, but it made him mortal again, letting Jack and Kate kill him before the Island was destroyed. ("The End")

Soundtrack dissonance

Though the songs in Lost often suit the scene, they sometimes deliberately conflict with the current action.

Dramatic irony

The sentiments that characters express often appear ironic when we know things that they don't. We sometimes only realize these words' irony in hindsight.

Season 1

Jack told Rose not to worry about turbulence. Their plane crashed. Later, he reintroduced himself by saying: "I'm the guy who told you not to worry about the turbulence." ("Pilot, Part 1") ("Walkabout")

Locke said that none of the survivors would deliberately hinder an attempt to get off the Island. Later, he blew up a station, a submarine and even killed to keep them on the Island. ("...In Translation")

Arzt lectured about the dangers of dynamite. He died in a explosion while mishandling dynamite. ("Exodus, Part 1")

Rose told Bernard on their honeymoon that she'd rather have spent it together on a beach than in the Australian desert. They each then crashed on to a beach, but they spent a month and a half apart. ("S.O.S.")

Sayid said that the day he trusted Ben would be the day that he sold his soul. He ended up spending years working for Ben. ("The Economist")

Elsa expressed disappointment that she wasn't the reason Sayid stayed in Berlin. She was the reason, but not in the way she thought. ("The Economist")

Kate preferred not to take Aaron in her arms, saying she would do a terrible job in raising a baby. Claire joked that Kate should try motherhood sometime. In the future, Kate would not only have a son, she actually ended up raising that same child that sparked the conversation. ("Eggtown")

Season 5

Neil complained about Bernard's incapability of creating fire, just before being shot with a flaming arrow. ("The Lie")

Jones told Richard the "sodding old man" couldn't track him and knew less about the Island than him. In reality, Locke was an expert tracker with a unique connection to the Island. ("Jughead")

Ben commented that "I've found sometimes that friends can be significantly more dangerous than enemies, John." He was unknowingly addressing The Man in Black who had taken the form of Ben's quasi-ally Locke. ("Dead Is Dead")

Widmore asked why Daniel's body looks "so familiar" to him. Charles not only met Daniel 20 years earlier - he was also his father. ("Follow the Leader")

When Sun asks Ben what happened to the rest of the statue, Ben replies that he doesn't know and that it was like that when he first arrived on the Island. She asks if he expects her to believe that and he replies, "Not really." ("The Incident, Part 2") But we later learn that, for once, he was telling the truth. ("Ab Aeterno")

Season 6

The Man in Black derided Locke for "shouting at the world for telling him what he couldn't do". Later though, he shouted at Jacob's ghost with these words. ("LA X, Part 2") ("The Substitute")

Jack told Hurley that he didn't want children and that he would "make a terrible father." Then in a flash-sideways, he created David, with whom he desperately wanted a relationship. ("Lighthouse")

Season 2

On meeting, both the Losties (Sawyer, Jin and Michael) and the Tailies believe the other party to be "The Others". ("Orientation")

Libby told the group that Nathan always dodged about himself, but Libby was definitely the one who always dodged. She dodged about her past to Hurley, and she even made up things like saying Hurley had stepped on her foot on the plane, in order to prevent Hurley remembering her and knowing her past. ("The Other 48 Days")("Three Minutes")

Jack tells his wife the truth about the kiss between him and another woman, thinking that a bit of honesty might help an already failing marriage. Jack indeed says that he will "fix this". On the contrary, his wife was cheating on him all along, and she is ultimately the one who leaves him. ("The Hunting Party")

Charlie refuses to give Ana Lucia the gun because the last time she used one, she murdered someone. However, this is also true for Charlie, as, excluding "Exodus, Part 1" where he did not use his gun, he murdered Ethan the last time he handled a gun. ("The Whole Truth")

Season 3

One of the stations' names is The Flame. It ultimately blows up in flames. ("Enter 77")

Anthony Cooper discovers James Ford used his alias on "some kind of revenge kick." It turns out the name Cooper used, Tom Sawyer, was also taken from the character by the same name, and is not his real name either. ("The Brig")

Ben hands Alex the gun she gave to Locke so he could protect himself, and with which he shot Locke; she accepts it with a bloodied hand, and soon passes it to Karl to use against the Others to help the Losties. ("Greatest Hits")

Throughout season three, Charlie never knows how he is going to die, so Desmond must save him, since he can do nothing to prevent it; yet when he finally does know when and how he will die, he chooses to accept it instead of saving himself. ("Through the Looking Glass, Part 1")

The helicopter crew tries to get to the freighter, thinking that it will save their lives. At the same time, Desmond, Michael and Jin want to get off the freighter because they are all about to die when the bomb explodes.

We are led to believe from the flash-forwards that the Oceanic Six left the people on the Island, while in fact the Island 'left' them. ("There's No Place Like Home, Part 2")

Michael is killed by a bomb that is not his while not wanting to die, while he was earlier wanting to die, but his bomb would not detonate. ("There's No Place Like Home, Part 2")

Miles has lived all his life without knowing his father, only to find him back in year 1977, just after his own birth. ("Some Like It Hoth")

Daniel tells Eloise to bury the bomb that she later will help (attempt) to detonate, at his advice.

The survivors of Flight 815 knew nothing about Jacob, but many of them had met him; The Others knew and revered Jacob, but none of them ever met him. ("The Incident, Part 1")

The first and second time Eloise and Daniel meet, she asks him "Who are you?" Daniel is her son.

"Locke" criticizes Caesar for calling people "friend" when he doesn't really mean it. Many years earlier, the man who was impersonating Locke in that scene called Jacob "friend" after he had openly admitted the intent to kill him. ("Dead Is Dead")("The Incident, Part 1")

Season 6

When Hurley first met Jacob, he incorrectly assumed that Jacob was dead ("The Incident, Part 1"); When they meet again, Hurley assumes that Jacob is alive, but he is, in fact, dead. ("LA X, Part 1")

The Man in Black, in Locke's form, tells Richard, "I would have treated you with respect" [rather than not informing him of important goings-on like Jacob] right after he knocks him unconcious and hangs him from a tree in the jungle. ("The Substitute")

Richard, Miles and Frank decide to fly the Ajira plane off the Island to stop the Man in Black from leaving, not realizing he has a boat. To further add to the irony, they still fly the plane off the Island with Kate, Sawyer and Claire unaware that the Man in Black had already been killed by Jack, although Kate and Sawyer may have told them and Claire that not long after going home. ("The End")

Desmond spent years trying to win the respect of Charles Widmore, who thought he lacked both useful skills and character. When that no longer matters, he becomes indispensible to Charles through a unique talent that's likely to get him killed. ("Happily Ever After") In the afterlife he has Widmore's complete trust and admiration but can't remember why he wanted it.("The End")